ByElizabeth Drake, Monitor contributorOctober 26, 2012

Sylvia Plath, American poet, novelist, and short story writer, was born in Boston, Massachusetts on Oct. 27, 1932. A straight-A student, she attended Smith College on a scholarship. Starting in 1950, Plath began publishing in national magazines and journals. During the summer of her third year, Plath was awarded a prestigious position as guest editor at Mademoiselle magazine in New York. The experience did not turn out as she had hoped, and later that summer she attempted suicide. Plath returned to Smith six months later, completed an honors thesis, and graduated cum laude in 1955. She received a Fulbright scholarship to attend Newnham College, Cambridge University. In England, Plath met Ted Hughes, who would become a major English poet, and married him in 1956. In 1960, her first book "The Colossus" was published. In 1962 Plath and Hughes separated and Plath moved to a small flat with her two children. There she struggled with mental illness but also wrote much of her most powerful poetry. On February 11, 1963, Plath committed suicide at the age of 30. Two years after her death, "Ariel," a collection of some her last poems, was published, followed by "Crossing the Water" (1971) and "Winter Trees" (1971). Her "Collected Poems" was published later (1981), edited by Hughes. Today Plath is recognized as a leading confessional poet.

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